Finding Balance: Itálica y La Catedral de Sevilla

As a program we have a couple trips near Sevilla scheduled towards the beginning of the semester. On Saturday we went to Itálica, a 30 minute bus ride away. I had no idea what Itálica was, I'd never heard of it, I knew nothing of its significance, and I couldn't have predicted that I would love Roman ruins as much as I do until I saw them for the first time.

Itálica was a Roman city built after Rome won the Punitive Wars against Carthage. I've always really enjoyed my history classes but it never occurred to me that I could have such a good time visiting the sites similar to ones I'd learned about, but I was in awe. It was cold and dreary outside, and if I turned off my listening ears for even one minute I lost whatever our tour guide (and professor at the school, Fernando) was talking about and it would take a good five minutes to get back on track, but I did take away a lot of information and realized that seeing more sites that preserve history is something I really want to do.

Middle of the arena where gladiators fought; This pit could be covered to fight lions on ground or could be filled with water to fight crocodiles (I think?); when the rich viewers wanted to partake in the games they could put slaves in little boats on the water and use a bow and arrow to just try to shoot them as they tried to evade their shots.

view from inside a corridor of the amphitheater where the entire city of Itálica fit to enter

Beside the amphitheater was the city itself, this is the main road. Did you know? The Romans invented the street curb?

Part of the structure of one house. All floors were elaborately decorated with mosaics; the more important the room, the more color and elaboration was used.

Mosaic dedicated to each saint for each day of the week

Call me nerdy, but I really loved hearing about this stuff. Its so interesting to me to walk in footsteps of people that were here thousands and thousands of years ago, and to see how things they developed are still used just the same as today.

As for la Catedral de Sevilla: the highpoint was (literally and figuratively) at the top of the giralda, the huge tower that overlooks Sevilla. When it was built it was the tallest tower in the world. After a 2-hour tour in the coldest building in the city (and that says a lot), I can say it was worth it because of the view from the top. The tour itself was cool and I definitely appreciated it, but there's only so many Renaissance paintings of religious scenes I can look at. Plus we were late to the tour and flustered and sweaty to begin with, so I think I'll just remember being extremely freezing when I think back on this tour if I don't post some good pictures and say what I learned.